


Legends of Westeros: An MMORPG Story

by fangirlfish (elew223)



Series: Legends of Westeros (MMORPG) [1]
Category: A Song of Ice and Fire & Related Fandoms, A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - High School, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Video Game World, Gamer Jonsa, Ghost is a Samoyed, Ghost is a dog, Inspired by Love 020
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-06-02
Updated: 2019-07-27
Packaged: 2020-04-06 09:33:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 18,696
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19059961
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elew223/pseuds/fangirlfish
Summary: Welcome to the newest MMORPG, The Legends of Westeros. Join other players exploring Westeros from centuries ago. Who will prove to be the greatest warriors of the world?Sansa Stark never really thought of herself as a gamer the way her brother Robb and sister Arya are. However they managed to convince her to give it a try. Now she plays when she doesn't have to worry about homework and tests. Who knows what adventures await her in her next game session.





	1. Ba$terds and Wandering Crows

**Author's Note:**

  * For [kazetoame](https://archiveofourown.org/users/kazetoame/gifts), [General_Crow](https://archiveofourown.org/users/General_Crow/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Virtual (Alayne)](https://archiveofourown.org/works/14012448) by [Amymel86](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Amymel86/pseuds/Amymel86). 



Sansa opened up her laptop on her desk and carefully double clicked on the icon for the game. She grinned as the familiar login window opened up. She carefully typed her username and password before clicking on the “login” button. The screen turned into a giant, stylized compass that started rotating as the program began connecting to the game server.

The screen changed after about fifteen seconds. A large message appeared causing Sansa to grin wider.

_Greetings, Minisa Redwolf! Please confirm your statistics and profile information._

Sansa nodded as she carefully scrolled through various details about her player status in the game.

_Player Name: Minisa Redwolf (User ID: 000002839)_

_Gender: Female_

_Player Level: 12 (8189 / 24000 XP)_

_HP: 24000 / 24000_

_MP: 13000 / 13000_

_Marital Status: Unmarried_

_Player Type: Song Sorceress (Acolyte)_

_Element Affiliation: Water/Ice_

_Clan: The Pack of Winterfell (#60)_

_Alliance: Winter-Rose (#49)_

_Weapons: Summoner’s Harp (Weirwood & Unicorn hair strings); Summoner’s Flute (Valyrian Steel); Poison Dagger (Castle forge steel; Potion coated poison); Enchanted Staff (Weirwood)_

_Armor: Song Sorcerer’s robes (Acolyte), Dragon Skin leather boots; Mother’s Blessing Pendant;_

_Special Items: Songs of Ice and Fire (Song Sorcery Spell Book); Maester Mirabel’s Manual of Potions;_

_Miscellaneous Items: Poison antidotes (57/100); Burn Salve (85/100); Health Restoration potion (74/100); Mana Restoration Potion (95/100); Dragon Fever (5/40); Apothecary’s Ingredient Box (Click to see ingredient inventory); Apothecary’s Potion Making Kit; Roasted meat (84/100), Wild Berries (75/100); Bread (50/100)_

Sansa was able to see everything was correct. Legends of Westeros was currently undergoing beta testing for a new upgrade to the game world. From what Sansa could tell, the upgrade would expand the number of quests for players, new Monster Bosses to fight, and adding more towns and cities into the game world. It appeared the game designers were focusing more on the North, the Lands Beyond the Wall, and Dorne. Early adapter players like Sansa were amongst the lucky players selected to participate in the testing phase. All the players with User ID’s from 1 to 5000 were invited to participate in the beta testing that would last for a whole year before the rest of the users could play the fine tuned game. As a beta tester, Sansa would be asked to verify her player profile information was still accurate as there was always a possibility of data not being saved properly since the new phase of the game was isolated on a separate server from the other servers hosting the MMORPG.

Sansa clicked confirmation that her player info was correct before the game finished connecting to the server. Her character appeared at the last location she was at before she left the game. She was at the Long Lake where there was a small fishing village on the shores of the lake. She went over to the bulletin board in the modest village square. The bulletin board posted various types of useful game information for players before they wandered the area in the Long Lake District. She glanced at the various bits of news.

There was the usual section warning players about the various types of wild animals, which were of course fantastical versions of real animals to be found in the real world Long Lake National Park. These fantasy animals were mostly dangerous and that could be killed for some gold coins and XP as rewards. Once in a while, fur, bone, or antlers would also be dropped for killing them. They could be useful as either potion ingredients or traded to craftsman that could make clothing or weapons from them. Killing Charging Stags, Wild Boars, and even game birds also provided meat. She could cook the meat for consumable food for HP restoration, or sell the meat to a butcher in a nearby village or city for gold.

There was another section announcing the next Player vs Player (PVP) championship was happening in Last Hearth tomorrow and in three other locations. Sansa was debating about whether she wanted to try competing in one of the events before shaking her head. She wasn’t really a big fan of PVP competitions. It was mostly something for the warrior class characters to play. The only magic users that participated tended to be people that were at least level 18, who were impossible for her to go up against at her current level. Sansa quickly pulled up the Alliance tab of her player interface and she clicked on the “message all members” option. She tapped out a simple message telling everyone in the Winter-Rose Alliance that if they were planning to log into the game tomorrow, there were PVP matches happening in four different places. She wasn’t sure who would be online tomorrow, but she knew some of the alliance members would be interested. Robb, Theon, and a few others would love the opportunity to level up and possibly earn free items for beating up other players.

Participation required a 10,000 gold entrance fee, which allowed players to battle in ten rounds for the chance to earn back 1,000 gold per victory along with earning XP and changing their position in the PVP rankings. Players that couldn’t actually pay the full fee were allowed to submit items that would be worth the 10,000 gold to cover the fee. Some players opted to have side bets as well. Robb, Theon, and occasionally Arya and Gendry did the side bets and have won their fair share of valuable equipment and extra items.

Sansa closed the in-game messaging system and went back to the bulletin board. There was one administrator notice warning players that there were some illegal PVP killings happening in the Wolfswood. One of the rules of Legends of Westeros stated that PVP killing was only allowed in very particular circumstances. There were of course the PVP championships. Also players could issue formal duel challenges to settle any disagreements happening in the game and were only permitted to fight in PVP stadiums. However directly attacking other players outside of the PVP stadiums violated game rules and could result in account suspension or even I.P. banning from the game.

Sansa frowned after reading the administrator notice and made sure she had all her armor on and her weapons equipped for easy access. Her character wasn’t designed to be a warrior like Robb’s Great Sword Berserker or Arya’s Shadow Assassin. However all characters had basic skills in using daggers or bow and arrows when starting out in the game. Even though she was a magic user, Sansa’s character had to use physical attacks to help her siblings fight monsters when they were lower level players and hadn’t learned advanced spells or possessed a large amount of mana. She made sure her dagger would be coated with a very effective poison called Dragon Fever. It causes anyone or anything she cut with it to lose 100 HP every three seconds until they died or managed to cure themselves of the poison. Fortunately the player profile had a featured that allowed her to see how much poison effectiveness her dagger had left before she needed to reapply the poison.

Sansa soon made her way into the Wolfswood after leaving the Long Lake Fishing Village. The Wolfswood was one of the best places to find various plants, minerals, and even items like bird feathers that were very useful in potions. When she wasn’t joining in quests or challenges with her Clan or Alliance members, she enjoyed wandering the various woods and environments gathering random potion ingredients. She was constantly brewing potions, which fortunately continued brewing until the game informed her of their completion. She would promptly make more that would continue brewing even when she went offline.

It was worth the investment purchasing five cauldrons and burners so she could brew multiple potions at a time. It was much easier buying common potions like the HP and MP restorative potions whenever she was in one of the established human settlements as even modest places like Long Lake Fishing Village had an apothecary who sold those things for very low amounts of gold. However she used the potion making skills she developed to make the rarer and more unique potions. There were occasions in the past, she sold one or two of them for some gold that helped her and her siblings  when they were lower level players and needed the money. However now, the potions she brewed were excellent bonuses for their own consumption.

Sansa happily wandered around and managed to pick up half a dozen types of wild herbs and flowers she had been looking for. There was a really effective strength potion that Robb and the others were interested in trying out. It would allow players to get a twenty-five percent boost to their attack and HP for half an hour of game play. Such a thing would admittedly be very handy to use when they try to attack a “Great Boss” monster. It wasn’t difficult to brew this potion, but it did require a lot of ingredients, half of which are expensive to buy in the Ingredients Market due to the rarity and difficulty of locating them out in the wild. Fortunately her current gathering mission reduced her list of ingredients she still needed for the Berserker’s Strength Potion. She did however realize she had the ingredients for more Dragon Fever and a couple other poisons that were also effective to use on weapons. Gathering a couple dozen wild berries were also handy for providing minor amount of HP and MP restoration for the consumer.

Her luck soon ran out when suddenly she heard a snap of a twig and soon found herself being surrounded by eleven players. She glanced at each of them on her screen trying to see what their user names were. They were quite clever having strange names like “Reeker29324829572” and “Bobobobobo!9328402!” The only easy to understand thing she could read was that they were all part of the same Clan called “Ba$teRd Boyz.”

“Hey cute thing,” one of them typed out in the convo box.

Sansa sighed. “Something the matter, Reeker?”

“Heh, just seeing if you needed help. You’re wandering around all alone like a lost lamb in the woods. Or maybe Red Riding Hood,” this Reeker character typed.

Sansa narrowed her eyes while typing her response. “I’m perfectly fine. Just gathering stuff and waiting for my Clan to show up.” Usually mentioning her Clan was appearing soon would make other players back off thinking she was easy pickings for being a lone player. She didn’t have a particularly high ranking level wise or per her PVP ranking. However her Clan was definitely much higher at sixtieth place in the Clan Rankings compared to the number four hundred nine marked on theirs.

“Heh, we’ll take care of business before they show up,” Reeker typed before the group started attacking.

Sansa nimbly jumped away and quickly strummed her harp to produce a powerful shield that would temporarily give her an extra two thousand HP and reduce the effectiveness of attacks by fifteen percent until the shield collapsed. She then strummed the harp and played the Mandala Fire Lullaby, which would create a literal circle of fireballs to appear around her that would launch at her enemies like rockets. Her Mandala fireballs were making some effect, but these rogue player killers clearly had some type of mage in their group who kept using shields to help lessen the effectiveness of her fire attacks.

That Reeker guy especially was ruthless attacking her. He pulled out a weirwood bow and started shooting arrows at her shield. They were very powerful arrows that caused various effects from lightning bolts to acid burning through her shield. She was forced to stop her Mandala Fire Lullaby to strengthen her weakening Harmonious Shield after summoning two or three rounds of shooting fireballs at them. Unfortunately it was her strongest attack spell that didn’t involve sacrificing large amounts of mana while maintaining her shield.

“Damnit!” Sansa cried as she started noticing her mana was now down to 1,200 and was continuing to drop. These player killers were able to replenish some of their HP so they didn’t completely die off despite her constant bombardment. They kept attacking her, so she wasn’t able to take the mana replenishing potions.

Suddenly the bushes rustle and someone leaped out with a sword drawn and immediately slashed and stabbed two of the “Ba$teRd Boyz.” They collapsed to the ground and immediately vanished from the scene after being killed. Being killed in the game meant they were ejected from the game and had to wait 30 seconds before they could log back in. Two more players emerged and joined the counterattack as well. One had a large axe, which was effective at killing another two players. The third figure had a rapier that reminded Sansa of Arya’s Needle, which she recently upgraded to have Valyrian steel instead of castle forged steel. Sansa switched to her Summoner’s flute and played a couple rounds of Icicle Air, to kill one of her attackers with a couple giant shards of ice in his chest. Her three saviors finished off the other “Ba$teRd Boyz” in quick succession before turning to face the last member.

Sansa smirked slightly as “Reeker” quickly fled the scene, but not before she used her flute for her Autumn’s Gust Etude to knock him down and deliver 500 HP damage. She turned to look at her new saviors and carefully looked at who they were.

“Are you okay?” the first player named “WhiteWolf69” asked. His Clan was called “Wandering Crows,” which were currently ranked seventy-five in the Clan ranking. He was a level eighteen player and only three PVP levels higher than Robb. The character design was a male who appeared to be slightly taller than her. He had black hair that was tied into a part man-bun. He had dark eyes with a small scar over one of them. He wore sturdy leather armor with metal studs that appeared to be made from Valryian steel, which likely offered a defense boost. He wore a black fur cape that appeared to be very luxurious, though Sansa wasn’t certain how much protection it offered. She was impressed that he had a Valyrian bastard sword similar to the one “Knight Of Flowers” from Knights of Summer had, though his wasn’t Valyrian steel.

“Thank you for helping me. They were attacking me so much I wasn’t able to use MP replenishers. I might have died in another couple minutes if you didn’t show up,” Sansa replied. She quickly clicked onto her inventory and consumed at least four of the potions until she had a full MP bar again. She also consumed seven HP potions to restore her health. While she made sure her stats were up again, she got a text message from Robb.

_Hey Sansa,_

_I’m logging in a couple minutes. Theon, Gendry, and Arya are showing up too. Meet us at Wintertown Market square._

Sansa quickly texted back before focusing on the chat she was in.

“Well we were sort of on patrol around here ever since we heard the rumors about player killers on the loose in the Wolfwood,” the axe wielding player called “Grenn Skullbasher” replied. He was also part of “Wandering Crows.”

“On patrol?” Sansa was confused. She hadn’t heard of players going on patrol anywhere in the game.

“Eh, it’s just us wandering around the woods following rumors and chatroom complaints about people getting jumped in the game. Hey, oh great leader! I got a screenshot of that last douche that got away. We can start digging into who he is and report to admins about him,” the third guy called “PypDaBard” typed.

“Cool man, that’s a useful clue to send to the admins,” wrote WhiteWolf69.

“The other guys you killed were all in the same Clan as Reeker. I managed to see that much before they started attacking,” Sansa typed.

“Thanks Minisa,” WhiteWolf69 wrote back.

“Hey, I’m getting out of the game for a few to do some digging with Sammy boy. Later!” The player called PypDaBard disappeared.

“I’m calling it a night. I gotta get to work in the morning. Laterz!” typed Grenn Skullbasher before he vanished as well.

“I guess I’ll head off if you’re okay now. Glad to help another player in need,” WhiteWolf69 typed.

Sansa quickly replied back. “Wait.”

“Yes?”

“If you have the time, I was hoping you’d come along with me. Are you and your friends in an Alliance?”

WhiteWolf69 typed again. “We used to be part of Castle Black Clan, which is part of The Nights’ Watch Alliance, but well… we had some issues with those guys and started our own five member clan. We haven’t really decided on what Alliance to try joining. We’ve only been in our own clan for about two months. Occasionally, we’ll do stuff with people from the W1ldlyngs Alliance, but we didn’t join up with anyone.”

Sansa smiled at that. “What if you join the Alliance I’m in?”

WhiteWolf69 was silent for almost a minute. “Wait… you’re in The Pack of Winterfell????”

Sansa giggled before answering WhiteWolf69. “Yeah, we formed an alliance with Knights of Summer and we’re negotiating with Furious Stormlords and Blazing Sunspears.”

WhiteWolf69 took a minute to respond. “Wow, that’s impressive. I just saw your Alliance is in the Top 40 List. That Reeker guy and his goons were nuts attacking you. You probably have plenty of people that could help you kick their asses.”

Sansa smirked. “My brother would probably insist everyone get in line behind him.”

“You have a brother playing the game?”

“Yeah. Actually my brother, sister, and I started The Pack of Winterfell together. Then we started inviting some of our friends and eventually one of our younger brothers was old enough to start playing. His friends got invited as well.”

“That’s actually impressive. There’s not a lot of Clans that have members that actually know each other offline,” WhiteWolf69 replied.

“I got a text message from my brother. He and a few our of Clan members are logging on tonight. If you want, you can come with me and meet them. It’s the least I could do after you and your friends saved me,” Sansa quickly typed. She couldn’t help hoping this guy would come meet Robb and the others.

“Sure. I was going to play another half an hour anyway. Where are we going?” WhiteWolf69 asked.

“Wintertown Market Square. We usually meet up by the water fountain before going off on a quest and stuff.”

“Let’s go.” They each clicked the teleport button and off they went.


	2. How It Began

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Every character has an origin story. Here we find out the previously non-gamer Sansa Stark converted.

Sansa remembered how it got started. Like many people her age, she had grown up with video games and computer games being a thing her peers were into. Her brothers and sister certainly had fun playing them. Sansa wasn’t very good at it and preferred reading or doing one of her favorite handicrafts. However Robb discovered a game when they were in high school that he thought she’d like.

“Come on Sansa! I think you’d like this one. It’s a role playing game,” Robb said with a grin. Arya and Bran nodded in agreement at that.

“Yeah, all my friends said their sisters love playing this game too,” Bran piped up.

“I tried playing it at Lyanna’s house the other day. It was actually a lot of fun. I think you’d like it,” Arya added.

Sansa stared at the game’s packaging. She had to admit the artwork was beautiful. She saw several characters in various styles of costuming and different types of weapons. The background featured a beach and presumably some ocean or sea. There was even a small image of a dragon in the sky. She read the name of the game. “Legends of Sothoryos: Return of the Queen.”

“Lyanna let me play as her character for half hour. It’s pretty cool. You choose the type of character you want to be. You can customize what the character looks like. When you level up to certain levels you gain status boosts. If you picked a magic user, your character learns new spells or your powers evolve somehow,” Arya explained.

Sansa had to admit she was intrigued by this. “So what exactly are role playing games?”

Robb looked pleased his non-gamer sister was getting interested. “Well basically you play the game as a character in the story. Some of your choices affect what happens to you in the game. Actually in this game you can choose to take on challenges alone and join up with other characters to fight together. There’s random monsters you fight for rewards like gold coins or random objects you can use later. There’s apparently four possible endings to the game depending on the choices you made earlier.”

Sansa agreed to try playing the game at least once with her siblings. Robb had saved up some of his allowance to buy the game. It took almost half an hour to install the game onto Robb’s, Sansa’s, and Arya’s laptops. Bran was still in elementary school and would have to use their dad’s home office PC to do homework. However his older siblings agreed to allow access to their laptops to play the game whenever they didn’t need it. Bran was content with just watching his older siblings play for the time being.

Robb winked before taking control of Sansa’s laptop for a couple minutes before she started playing the game. “I did some digging around on the official website. There’s actually a bonus cheat feature they have if you want to use it.”

“A bonus cheat?” Sansa asked with a frown. She never liked cheating even if this was just a computer game.

“Relax! It’s nothing big really. Basically I just need to go into the subfolder for this game on your laptop and swap out a couple image files located in the subfolder of images used in the game,” Robb said as he began doing so.

“What does this cheat do?” Arya as curiously.

“It’s actually pretty cool. Your dorm room at the Magic Academy will change. The cheat creates an extra treasure chest in your room. It’s all five Magical Guild books,” Robb explained. He soon gave Sansa control of her laptop again.

Arya’s eyes widened. “That’s so cool! Do mine next!” Arya was practically bouncing in her seat as she quickly scooted over and let Robb have room to work on her machine.

“Magical Guild Books?” Curiosity about this game was mounting. Bran as sitting next to her looking in Robb’s direction.

“In the game, you’ll eventually get to a Magic Academy to learn different spells that the Mage character will be using in the game. Once you’ve graduated the school after doing a really difficult quest, that character will be a Mage instead of an apprentice in the game. The mage can choose to join one of five possible Wizarding Guilds. Each guild has a book of spells you can learn and cast in battle situations. Anyways this cheat means you’ll have access to all the guild spell books and not limited to just one,” Robb said as he quickly worked on adding the cheat feature to Arya’s computer.

Sansa had to admit she was shocked at how quickly the next two hours flew by as her character went on quest after quest meeting new characters along the way. She had chosen to be the mage. The game was structured around the same storyline, but the beginning of the story changed depending on which character you selected to be the “main character.” As a female mage named Fallah, she came from a well to do family in a small town. She soon becomes friends with a local girl who accidentally discovered she possessed magic that could only be channeled through a weapon instead of a wizard’s staff. They had to travel together to the Magic Academy, but naturally there were monsters to kill along the way, despite the fact they didn’t know spells yet, so they had to physically fight with sticks as primitive weapons against spiders, rats, and wild birds that attacked them.

It took Sansa, Robb, and Arya about two months of playing on the weekends in between homework, school projects, sports games, and family gatherings to finish the game. Sansa couldn’t help but high five Robb and Arya after Fallah and the other characters finished off the dread demon Lord Metrallus and saved Sothoryos from the return of a terrible demon king. It even turned out the character that channeled through weapons was the long lost princess and rightful queen!

“That was amazing! I can’t believe I finally did it!” Sansa beamed at her siblings.

Arya smirked. “And you thought computer games were stupid.”

Sansa rolled her eyes. “Shooting games are boring. Role playing games are so much fun. The stories were interesting with all those twists and turns. The characters are unique and have to come together to save the day. That’s interesting stuff.”

“You know they aren’t as complicated as RPG’s, but some of the simulation games are fun. Like there’s this game where you have to run restaurants, earn money, and gain popularity with the citizens of different towns over this big chain fast food place out for conquest,” said Robb.

“That actually sounds interesting. Anything else you’d recommend?” Sansa was intrigued.

“There’s this other game like that restaurant game except you’re in a fairytale world and you have to run a potion making shop and have to have more customers than rival potion makers to win each of the different regions,” Robb smiled.

“Oooh! That sounds like fun!” Sansa nodded eagerly at that. He had her at the word “fairytale.”

Before she knew it, Robb was going to be graduating high school and heading off to Oldtown for university. He was planning on studying business and eventually take over Winterfell Inc. when their father was ready to retire in another thirty years or more in the future. Despite their pleading, Bran and Rickon were told that they would still need to share a room instead of letting one of the boys take over Robb’s room.

“He’ll be home for summer break and Solstice celebrations, you know,” their father explained to the disappointed boys.

It was precisely when Robb came home for Solstice break that their parents gave them a shocking gift. Ned and Catelyn gave Bran and Rickon each a Lego set they wanted.

Bran grinned as he stared at the box. “Wow, a Star Wars set! This looks cool, Mom! Thanks, Dad!”

Rickon bounced in his seat as he looked at his large bucket of blocks. He didn’t have the patience just yet to build a full replica of movie sets like Bran did. “Thanks for my Legos!”

Ned then pulled out three envelopes and passed one each to Robb, Sansa, and Arya. “Well I had to do some research asking a few people, but I figured you three would like this.”

Sansa carefully opened the sealed envelope and pulled out the thin card inside. She carefully read the card and her eyes widened.

“OH MY GOD!” Arya shouted.

Robb stared at his parents. “Wow, this is amazing. Thank you!”

Ned smiled at that. “I’m glad you three like it.”

“What is it?” Rickon asked staring at his older siblings curiously.

“We just got activation codes for Legends of Westeros!” Arya bounced up and down.

Bran frowned. “Really? I love my Legos, but I kind of wish I got one too.”

Robb looked up at Ned curiously. “How did you get these Dad? I heard they are really hard to get since they only released 4,000 activation codes last month.”

Ned smiled. “I’ll only say that I know a couple people that could get me those codes. From what I understand, they are doing limited release and gradually allowing more people to create accounts once they’re sure the game if bug free based on what early adapter players say in their feedback.”

Catelyn eyed her three eldest sternly. “You can enjoy playing your game, but make sure you don’t neglect to keep up your grades. If I find out your grades are slacking because you’re playing the game, we can have your game accounts frozen.”

Robb, Sansa, and Arya swore they’d only play on the weekends and they’d show their parents their test scores to prove they’re not letting their game play take over their day to day lives, particularly Robb who no longer lived at home. They barely contained themselves, but they did manage enough self control to wait until the next morning to use their account activation codes.

With some guidance from Robb and Arya, Sansa made her customized character. She had always been  intrigued with magic and after a couple minutes of consideration, she decided to be a magic user known as a song sorceress. As a song sorceress, she could use offense and defense magic with spells that had to be sung or played via enchanted instruments. It was beautiful watching her character using a spell, the background music in the game changed. Whoever composed the music used violin, harp and even flute when she used spells. It was beautiful listening and playing the game. She customized her character “Minisa Redwolf” to look like her. “Minisa” had long red hair and blues eyes, just like her. She also wore a light pink tunic and white trousers and brown leather boots though like all the characters in the game, she had to ability to pay real world money for limited edition clothes to further customize the character with additional bonuses to the character.

Robb decided that the three of them should start their own private game clan, which is what teams were called in the game. The game allowed players to either form or join an existing clan to improve their chances at winning challenges and difficult quests. The Clans could be invite only, permission requested or open for anyone to join. The three Starks agreed they should make theirs invite only and appropriately named it The Pack of Winterfell.

It took them three years, but The Pack of Winterfell was currently ranked sixtieth out of two hundred sixty-eight clans in the list of Clans. It was very impressive given that their clan only had twelve members. Robb was currently in his last year of undergrad studies, Sansa was in her second year, with Bran and Arya still in high school. Rickon was a middle school student and wished he was allowed to play the game as well, but had no laptop of his own. Over time they invited other players to join their clan and assisted one another with quests and participating in special events that occurred throughout the year.

Theon Greyjoy lived down the street from the Stark household in their old neighborhood. He was living with his Uncle Rodrik Harlaw, who was a professor at the local community college. His older sister, Asha, also agreed to join “The Pack of Winterfell” after having a falling out with her previous clan “Wake the Kraken.” Arya’s friends, Gendry Waters, Ben “Hot Pie” Baker, and Nicolo “Lommy” Lombardi were allowed to join up. Bran invited Shireen Baratheon, Meera Reed, and Jojen Reed. Sansa never did find a friend that was interested in playing video games to invite.

Sansa decided to wander the game solo this evening, though Robb told her he’d log in and find her later after he finished his accounting homework. Good, responsible Robb Stark was doing a double major in accounting and finance with plans to get into business school for his MBA. Sansa was currently an English major and was thinking about either being a teacher or perhaps pursuing writing as a career. She was also working in the student run The Parchment & Quill literary magazine submitting her own short stories, which got some positive feedback.

Their parents made it clear that Arya and Bran were only allowed to play Legends of Westeros on the weekend and only after they finished their homework for the following Monday, so it wasn’t odd for Sansa to play solo at times. The only other people in the clan she might be able to play with during the week was Robb, Meera, Theon, Gendry, and Asha.

Sansa mostly wandered around the fantasy version of Westeros checking out the various areas of the game to fight monsters. After playing for about three years, Sansa was currently a level twelve player. She wasn’t an aggressive player during her high school years like Robb or Arya, who were both level fifteen players. Theon and Asha were each level sixteen. Even Meera and Gendry were currently level thirteen and started playing the game later than her. She didn’t regret that decision in the slightest. She was focused on doing good in school and she had other hobbies and loved being with her friends.

She decided to hang out at the Wintertown marketplace, which charmingly did look like what paintings depicted of the real Wintertown from a few centuries earlier when her family were the kings ruling the North. Many cities and large towns throughout Legends of Westeros were not only good places to buy up much needed supplies or even upgrades to clothing and weapons, but also acted as neutral place for player socializing. Battling was forbidden in the town markets, which was enforced with attack functions not working, including the use of offensive spells for magic user characters. Sansa, as a magic user character, was allowed to use healing magic in towns and other similar benign spells.

Sansa wandered through the various stalls and stores in Wintertown to see if there was anything worth purchasing. Certain merchants like the blacksmith, the tanner, and the tailor rotated and changed up what armor, weapons, and clothing were available for players to either upgrade their equipment or help customize the avatars. Sansa didn’t find anything she wanted to change up “Minisa’s” appearance. As a song sorceress, the only equipment boosts that would be useful to her tended to be rewards given after defeating monsters or completing quests. Most of her fellow clan members were different warrior types. So far only Sansa, Bran, Shireen and Jojen were magic users. At times, the four members would divide magic boosting equipment they obtained as rewards.

Sansa stopped by at the bakery and purchased some loaves of bread, which offered 250 HP per loaf. It wasn’t a lot of HP at the levels she and her Clan mates were at, but every little bit helped. They also made nice welcome gifts to new members that join the Alliance they were in. In fact she was planning on gifting some loaves to WhiteWolf69 and his clan mates next time she ran into any of them.

After WhiteWolf69, Grenn Skullbasher and PypDaBard helped save her from the Ba$terd Boyz, she introduced WhiteWolf69 to Robb and a few other Clan members that logged on that night. It didn’t take long to convince them to offer Wandering Crows clan a membership in the Winter-Rose Alliance. They sealed the deal with WhiteWolf69 joining them on a quest to beat a group of mountain trolls bothering the Flints of the Mountain.

Sansa moved her mouse as she had her character continue shopping and stocking up on various supplies. Things are going to get more interesting with these new Alliance members. She turned to leave the bakery and continue her shopping when the chat window popped up.

“Hi, Minisa. Here alone?” WhiteWolf69 typed.

Sansa smiled. “Not anymore.”


	3. About That User Name

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> So.. about Jon's username in the game...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just to make a note of the ages of the characters. The "present" time is when the characters are the following ages:  
> Theon - 25 years old  
> Robb / Jon / Sam / Grenn / Sam - 21 years old (3rd year university)  
> Sansa / Meera - 19 years old (1st year university)  
> Gendry - 20 years old (2nd year university)  
> Arya - 17 years old (3rd year HS)  
> Bran / Jojen - 15 years old (1st year HS)  
> Rickon - 12 years old (6th grade)
> 
> There are occasional "flashbacks" and there may possibly be upcoming chapters that will probably make references to their ages. This one for instance happens towards the end of Jon's first year of university. The previous chapter was mostly set a few months earlier than this chapter. The end of the previous chapter was set a few weeks after the first chapter.
> 
> Also I don't intend this story to be a "Bash Ygritte" story, but someone had to be Jon's ex-girlfriend in the story. I've kept it vague in this story and I don't really intend for there to be a full explanation as to what happened with their relationship. There may or may not be a later chapter where the superficial similarities between Ygritte and Sansa MIGHT come up.

Samwell Tarly was a nervous man. Everyone that knew him were well aware of this fact. However there were only a few things that made him worry and one of them was Jon getting angry at them. “Are you really sure we should be doing this?”

Grenn smirked. “Come on, Sam! This’ll cheer him right up!”

Sam gripped the hem of his t-shirt. “I don’t think this is a good idea. I mean why would any of this help Jon out?”

Eddison Tollett just drank his steaming mug of coffee. “I can’t help but agree with Sam. I don’t get how this will help Jon feel better.”

“You guys are being too negative. Jon needs to lighten up and this will help. He needs to get away from real life for a few hours and having some fun. He can’t kill Ygritte, but he can kill some monsters and let things go,” Pyp replied as he entered the payment information. They were using his debit card, but all the guys agreed to chip in 10 dragons each to buy a 1 year account with Legends of Westeros. Pyp carefully made sure to pick the “onetime payment option.” If Jon ended up liking it, he’d be responsible for renewing his account.

It only took about 15 seconds after double checking all the info was filled out correctly before Pyp’s e-mail inbox updated with the account activation code. Pyp had made sure he select the gift option so the code would be sent to him instead of Jon’s e-mail. It only took two minutes to use the activation code and create a new account. Only question left was what would be Jon’s username.

“How about Jon_Snow?” Edd replied unhelpfully.

Groans abounded. “You’re missing the point. You’re not supposed to use your real name! At least not your whole name,” Grenn grumbled.

“Well how about using Ghost in the name?” Sam suggested. “We all know how much he loves that dog.” It was true. Jon adored the new puppy he was in the process of adopting after Ygritte broke up with him. Jon was currently visiting the adorable Samoyed pup at the animal shelter where the puppy was still living at until Jon could take him for good after the semester ended.

Pyp nodded. “Hm… that’s a good thought. Makes sense to have Jon’s user name be about his new buddy.” Pyp began typing Ghost in the user name box and quickly saw not only was “Ghost” already get taken, but a few dozen different variations were already taken.

“Geez, how can so many people use Ghost in so many ways already?!” Grenn glared at the screen.

“You know… when Ghost is a grown up dog, he’ll look like a bloody wolf,” Edd commented before taking another gulp of his coffee.

Pyp perked up. “Yeah! A White Wolf!” Pyp quickly typed “White Wolf.” That name was taken, but there were fewer existing users that had “White Wolf” in their name.

“Are there any suggestions? Wouldn’t hurt to see if any suggestions in the name generator might work,” Sam suggested.

Pyp promptly did so and immediately smirked at one of the results. “Hey look guys!” he pointed at one name and immediately the others reacted. Grenn started cackling with glee. Edd smirked, but otherwise calmly drank more of his coffee.

Sam’s face grew red. “Really guys? You wouldn’t seriously pick that, would you?”

Pyp smirked at Sam. “Why the hell not? It’s hysterical! Ygritte never quit shutting the hell up about Jon going down on her. Apparently she doesn’t reciprocate like ever.”

Edd rolled his eyes. “Why are we talking about Jon’s sex life anyway? I don’t care and I really don’t need to hear about it.”

“Who knows maybe with this user name, some hot girl will hit on him in the game and he can find someone better than Ygritte,” Grenn grumbled.

Pyp nodded and quickly entered the user name Jon would end up with unless he decided to cancel the account. “There!” Now it was time for them to scram so Jon couldn’t yell at them when he got back and checked his e-mail.

* * *

 

Jon got back to his room after noticing everyone was gone. He was currently still in the dorms with Sam, Pyp, and Grenn with less than a week left before their school year was over for summer break. Jon and the guys would be packing up all their stuff and emptying out of the dorm. Very soon they’d be living off campus instead of the dorms, which meant they’d have to pack up everything and move into the new house they’ll call home for hopefully the next three years. Why were they able to move out of the dorms? The answer was their unexpected savior, Eddison Tollett.

Edd Tollett was both a friend and the teaching assistant they dealt with in their Introduction to the History of Essos class they were all required to take for their first year of university. He was a grad student in the history department and quickly befriended them when reliable Sam Tarly went up to him to ask him dozens of questions after their first class.

Edd was living in a two bedroom house with another grad student off campus. His landlords were the Seaworths. Mr. Davos Seaworth and his wife Marya were caretakers to a dozen homes that were just a five minute bike ride away from university property. Officially the homes were owned by the Baratheon brothers, but the Seaworths were the ones who really took care of the tenants’ needs and collected the rent. In exchange for 300 gold dragons a month per person, tenants living in the house agree to help maintain the properties with the typical house chores. As long as they didn’t cause any damages or mess up the house, they’d get a nice easy rent to pay. They were also a referral basis only.

When a group of girls graduate this semester, one of the houses freed up and Edd mentioned Jon and his dorm mates were good kids that might work out as tenants for the soon to be empty house. The four boys had to submit copies of their fall semester grades, a recommendation letter from a professor, and even some financial info to demonstrate they (or their parents) had the ability to pay for the rent. It took only two weeks between their group interviews with the nice couple and the background checks to finish.

In a few days, they would into the house with two smaller bedrooms and a master bedroom that was converted into a room that could be shared by two people. Jon personally didn’t care if he had to share a room with someone and neither did Sam. The other lucky break was that the Seaworths didn’t mind them having animals as long as they agreed to clean up after it and be responsible for the animal. Jon was pleased he could adopt the adorable Samoyed puppy he named Ghost.

Jon remembered the phone conversation he had with mother last month before final exam madness began. “Hey Mom, the guys and I found out there’s a house off campus available for rent right after the semester ends! We’re thinking about trying to rent the place instead of staying in the dorms.”

“Are you sure about this? How did you find out about it? How much will it cost?” Lyanna Snow asked with a bit of concern.

Jon couldn’t blame his mother. Lyanna worked hard as a single mom taking care of him. His estranged father regularly sent money to her to help pay for the major expenses to raise him. It still meant she had to work hard to take care of the everyday expenses that kept a roof over their heads. Jon was fortunate that his grades were good enough to get him a partial scholarship even though his father agreed to cover all the expenses for his college education. Gods only knew his father had more than enough money to pay for it. He was paying for Jon’s siblings and a couple distant cousins attending Westeros University as well.

“Actually our friend Edd told us about the house. The couple that manages the house work for the Baratheon brothers. They don’t advertise for tenants, but only consider students referred to them by other students that are tenants of the other properties. Anyways, I only have to pay 300 dragons a month if they agree to let me be a tenant. There’s a house that’ll soon be empty when the girls renting it graduate this semester and move out. It accommodates four people in the house, so if they let us rent the place it’ll be perfect,” Jon replied.

“Well, I have to admit that’s not bad. It’s 2,000 dragons a semester for you to live in the dorms. Your father is paying for it, but well a house for your four boys is not only cheaper but more space for you all I would imagine?” his mother replied.

“Yes. Edd took us to the house for a quick look around. It’s a two story house with a finished basement that’s got a washer and dryer. It’s extra space for us to maybe use as study space down there too along with general storage. There’s a small front garden that we’ll have to help take care of. We have to agree to help maintain the property with some chores like the garden and keeping the house clean. As long as we don’t cause any damages and pay regularly, they’ll keep the rent low for us,” explained Jon.

“Are you sure you and the boys can handle all that responsibility yourselves? The dorms might be away from home, but not quite the same as living in a house without anyone else other than you boys,” Lyanna said.

Jon couldn’t deny her concern. He might have been living away from home at university, but since they were in the university dorms, they didn’t have to worry about electricity, water, heating, or air conditioning. Everything was managed by the university and if something went wrong, it would easily be fixed by maintenance people. Any small problems in the house had to be handled by him or the other guys.

“Well you’ve taught me a lot living at home. Grenn’s family own a contracting business so he’s learned a few basic skills around the house. Pyp is more of a techie, but he’s not too bad as a helper. Sam is a decent cook actually. Certainly better than me,” Jon replied.

“If you boys are really confident then I’ll talk to your father and help cover your share of the rent. That is if they accept you as a tenant,” Lyanna said. If there was one thing Jon could count on was that his mother trusted his judgment of what he could handle. She always taught him to be self-reliant and know his limits.

Jon smiled as he opened his laptop and checked his e-mail. He hoped to get some of his test results today. He had gotten two grades already. He finished two final exams the past week with one more test happening on Tuesday. It was his introductory Computer Science, which he had no doubts he would get top marks in. He knew straight off he would be majoring in computer programming and was very motivated to get started on his degree. He already had excellent grades from his homework assignments and the class project he submitted two weeks ago. Now all that was left is the written final exam of the theoretical principles they studied.

He opened up the inbox and only noticed one new e-mail since earlier this morning. It was an e-mail from Symeon Games.

_Welcome WhiteWolf69!_

_You have been a gifted a one year subscription to Legends of Westeros! Your User ID is #4160. Your temporary password is 92fj@99ns!_

_Please log into your account and change the password to a preferred password that is at least 8 characters long. Please see password rules when changing the password for more details._

Jon glared at the screen. “WhiteWolf69? What the hell?!”


	4. Battle Couple

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jon and Sansa questing together solo without their respective Clan members. How will they do?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> One little bit of commentary, not all of the characters use special pseudonym usernames like Sansa or Jon do. A few of the characters opt to use part of their real names in their usernames.
> 
> I do apologize slightly for the fact I don't post this on a regular schedule. Partially this is because of offline stuff I'm currently dealing with. Nothing super serious, but they do take a bit more priority on my life. Also I've been slightly diverted from things related to GOT/ASOIAF and Jonsa for the last couple weeks. I've actually written stubs of chapters, including this one in order to feel like I've gotten some writing done, but I wasn't 100% sure what I wanted to post next in terms of the steps of their relationship. I think I have an idea what to post next, but it might take another couple weeks or so before I do. Mainly because it's related to the offline stuff I'm dealing with, but don't worry I'm not giving up on this story. After all, our favorite couple haven't met offline yet!

Sansa logged into the game as she often did on Friday night. Some might call it pathetic that she’d be staying online until past midnight to kill computer generated monsters, but she didn’t frankly care. Not when she have fun playing with others. She was getting close to leveling up to thirteen. The Songs of Ice and Fire said there would be two new spells available to her. Once she reached Level 11, she passed the special test that would allow her to have an important new item, The Songs of Ice and Fire, which was the official spell book for all song sorcerers. Each time she leveled up, she would have access to a new spell. She needed to learn at least fifteen spells song sorcerer spells by the time she was ready to take the next test to become a Master Song Sorceress.

A quick teleport action later, Sansa arrived at Wintertown market where she quickly spotted a familiar face. “Sorry, am I late? I hope you weren’t waiting too long.”

“It’s alright, Minisa,” WhiteWolf69 reassured her. “I wasn’t waiting too long at all. Any of your Clan member showing up tonight?”

“Not sure. My brother and a couple others might, but they’ll IM or text me if they show up. What about your friends?”

“Grenn has to get up early tomorrow. He’s trying to get more hours and more pay in his pockets. Pyp and Sam are both away for the weekend visiting their families. Edd is on a research trip for a good chunk of the summer, so he’s going to be away from the game. We’re lucky we can even get an e-mail from the guy. I’m solo tonight,” WhiteWolf69 replied.

“You’re not working?” Sansa asked. She had to admit she was kind of curious about this mysterious warrior she played with occasionally. However she never had the courage to ask too much and he appeared to be a gentleman not prying into her personal, offline life.

“Sort of. I have an internship at company that provides database and IT development services. I’ve actually made some decent money working there this summer,” WhiteWolf69 replied.

“Oh! So you’re a college student? Me too!” Sansa quickly wrote back.

“That’s a surprising coincidence. Where are you at? I’m at Oldtown,” WhiteWolf69 asked.

“I can’t believe this. So am I! My brother, Gendry, and Meera are also at Oldtown! Wonder if we’ve ever passed by each other on campus and just didn’t realize it,” Sansa typed. She couldn’t help staring at her screen in wonder. It was a strangely pleasant thought rather than worrying. Their new friends in the game were possibly classmates. Though based on what Wolf just revealed, he was likely a Comp Sci major, which she certainly wasn’t.

“That is an odd coincidence that. Are you still on campus?” WhiteWolf69 asked.

“No, we all left for the summer. My brother and I are home in the North. Meera’s also a Northerner, but she doesn’t live near us,” Sansa replied.

“Wait… you’re from the North? Gods… this is just too weird. I’m originally from the North too. My mother is still there. I’m from White Harbor,” WhiteWolf69 wrote.

“This is just amazing. We’re in Winterfell,” Sansa quickly typed. A smile grew on her face. So, her hero and now new partner in quests turned out to be a Northern boy.

“So that’s why you named your Clan ‘The Pack of Winterfell?’ That’s cool. You know the guys and I are still attending university. Do you think maybe we could all meet up offline sometime? That is if you and your clanmates want to as well,” WhiteWolf69 suggested.

Sansa quickly responded. “Yes. That would be nice. Maybe next time we’re all together in the game we can work it out.” It was much less intimidating meeting someone she only knew online with her brother and some other friends.

“You want to do a quest or do you prefer to do something else?” WhiteWolf69 changed subjects.

“I think a quest. I’m just a few hundred more XP from leveling up. If I do, I’ll have access to a couple more spells,” Sansa explained.

“Okay, let’s see what quests we can do with just two people,” WhiteWolf69 replied.

Soon Sansa focused on the bulletin board checking out what quests were newly activated. “Oh there’s the Kingswood Brotherhood quest,” Sansa immediately wrote. “It says that bandits have attacked people traveling there between the rest of the Crownlands and King’s Landing. If we beat them, we’ll earn 1,000 XP. That’s more than enough I need!”

“They do recommend you are at least level 10 if you’re part of a small party of players. Me and the boys played this quest before, but we were lower level players at the time. It’ll be interesting to see how it is playing this with just you as my partner,” WhiteWolf69 replied.

“Are you sure you won’t be bored doing this again?” Sansa asked. She didn’t want to force her friend to play something he did before. The Kingswood Brotherhood quest is one that always existed in the game for all players to try accomplishing for HP and random loot. The game servers generates this quest at random times for a week to give players the opportunity to do so before taking that quest offline for a few months.

“It’s fine. I love a good challenge. Let’s go,” he wrote back.

The teleport was quick as usual. They landed a few miles south of King’s Landing. The gossip from other players indicated bandits were located in this particular area of the Kingswood that day. It was a good starting point for their battle in the quest. The quest was simple, they had to defeat the bandits and collect an item of their leader, The Smiling Knight. They had to present the item to the Lord Commander of the King’s Landing City Watch to complete the quest.

“Got a strategy you want to use?” Sansa typed.

“Well since you’re the only magic user, we’ll need some of your defensive magic. But the bandits aren’t as strong as Smiling Knight. I think you wouldn’t have to use your shield much until he shows up. You have enough health and mana potions?” WhiteWolf69 asked her.

“Yeah I’ve got plenty. More than enough for a non-Boss battle,” Sansa said.

“Good, I made sure I refilled my stock before logging off the game too. We just have to wander around a bit and we’ll run into a bandit or twenty,” he replied.

Sansa giggled at that. “Okay.”

Wolf was right as within a minute of wandering around the Kingswood just off the Kingsroad, some bandits emerge from the bushes and behind trees around them.

“All travelers through these woods pay a toll. The price is all your gold and your fancy weapons,” one bandit said while the others guffaw.

“No thanks,” WhiteWolf69 replied.

They soon pulled their weapons out and started their attack. WhiteWolf69 had his sword drawn while Sansa quickly pulled out her Summoner’s harp and immediately played her Mandala Fire Lullaby. Some of the bandits started shouting in pain as her attack hit at least half the bandits. WhiteWolf69 quickly stabbed a couple of the bandits she had already hit with her fireball attack to kill them off. She knew his Valyrian sword was a powerful weapon that would kill anyone by itself. Stabbing someone already hit with major damage from her attack would rack up their kill count in this quest quickly. She immediately used the Mandala Fire Lullaby again and aimed for some of the other bandits she hadn’t already hit.

“You’ve gotten some serious damage on them, Minisa!” he quickly wrote her before returning his focus on a couple bandits that hadn’t been hit.

Sansa quickly switched to her Summoner’s Flute played a couple rounds of Icicle Air to hit a couple more bandits. The battle with this band didn’t take long to complete. Sansa smiled as the pop-up window announced she earned 500XP for defeating the men.

“Wow! I’m just a few hundred more away from level up!” Sansa quickly wrote.

“That’s great! What kind of spells are you going to get when you level up?” he asked as they started wandering through the forest again.

“Well I can use this spell on my flute that causes quicksand to appear under whoever I hit the spell at. I can also use a spell on my harp that summons a hailstorm to attack a party of enemies,” Sansa said.

“That hailstorm sounds really handy. The quicksand is funny though.”

Sansa grinned and typed. “I certainly thought so. It’ll be fun trying to use that in a battle at some point. I especially want the hailstorm spell. I’ll get bonus damage since I’ve got the water/ice affiliation.”

The two companions wandered a bit more through the woods and collected more XP beating another group of bandits. “Yes!!! I did it!” Sansa quickly clicked a few more buttons and she immediately activated two more spells her character could now use in battle. She made her character twirl around in excitement.

* * *

 Jon smiled as he saw Minisa twirling around in joy. “Congrats. Are you going to try using the new spells in the quest?”

“Sure. Why not? I should try them out and see how they look and work in the game,” she wrote back.

Jon couldn’t help but smile every time he spent time with his new alliance teammate. It still amazed him how quickly he had grown so fond of this stranger in a game. She (or at least he hoped she was a she) was always eager to tackle on challenges, but she didn’t run headlong into things. At least not like Arry Underfoot, who apparently was Minisa’s sister in real life.

Minisa was pretty feminine given her choice of white and pink clothing in the game. She wore a song sorceress robe, which was white as snow like the trousers she wore. The pink tunic and her character’s red hair was the only bit of noticeable color on the character. Minisa assured him despite appearances the robe did give her some level of protection, particularly against magic attacks as well as amplifying her magical offense and defense by ten percent.

Jon wasn’t really one to criticize the effectiveness of her robes at protecting her in battle. He wore leather instead of steel armor and had a black fur cloak he won as one of the top forty PVP competitors at a PVP tournament a few months ago. He did used to wear armor when he was a lower level player, but by the time he got to level 13, he started getting rid of the steel armor to get more of a challenge out of the fights with monsters. He also really enjoyed the more Northern look of his character.

“We’d better keep an eye and refill our health and mana. That Smiling Knight could be anywhere in this forest,” he wrote.

“Right.” The two characters glowed as they consumed potions to restore their health and mana, although Jon’s character didn’t use mana very often. As his character leveled up, he started learning special attacks that increased damage and caused other effects that made them more effective. Jon saved them for powerful monsters and bosses that he had to fight against. As a warrior, he didn’t have as much mana as characters like Minisa or Sam, so he’d run out mana fast if he used those types of attacks too often. It was to his benefit to regularly modify and in some cases replace his weapons to increase the attack effectiveness of his character.

“How tough is the Smiling Knight?” Minisa asked as they continued wandering the Kingswood. She occasionally stopped to collect things in the forest.

“He’s pretty tough, but I think the two of us are strong enough to handle him and the bandits that are usually with him. They’re a bit stronger than the ones we’ve dealt with earlier, but not by much. I think you should focus on using those attacks you can do on your harp. Those will help get rid of the bandits much faster. If you also hit the Smiling Knight, that’ll cause some damage to him and make it easier for me to attack him alone while you finish off his underlings,” Jon explained.

“What about my shield spell?” Minisa wrote back.

Jon thought for a moment. “It’ll help reduce the damage from their attacks, but you don’t need to renew it as often as you would other battles. They don’t have a magic user in their group. They are purely physical attackers. I think a few rounds of your offensive spells will get rid of them quickly and then you can focus to helping me attack Smiling Knight. He’s a tough bastard to kill. Some people on the forum speculate he’s got at least 40,000 HP, so we need to hit him hard to kill him. I think I’ll use some of my special sword strikes to get him.”

“I don’t often see you use them,” Minisa said.

Jon smirked. It’s true. He hadn’t shown her too many of his special attacks that used mana. There was one attack he recently got access to when he leveled up the other night. He hadn’t used it yet, but it was very impressive. Lightning Blade strike would require 750 MP per use, but it was pretty effective causing 1,500 HP damage on top of the 1,000 HP damage a sword slash would normally do since he was using a Valyrian steel sword. He also gained an additional 500 HP damage because of his Water/Ice element affiliation. Due to the quirky nature of electric and lightning attacks, players with water affiliation gained a bonus when such attacks were used.

“I’m looking forward to using Lightning Blade Strike. It’ll cause serious damage when I use it,” Jon quickly typed. “How many things have you gathered while we’ve been wandering around?”

“I think I have enough for a couple more potions I can brew. Do you need some poison to coat your sword?” Minisa asked.

Jon paused for a moment. He was always reluctant to do deceptive things like coating his weapons with poison. However he couldn’t deny that they did make a difference at times, especially for very challenging monsters where every little bit of damage players can inflict could make a difference. “I suppose it never hurts to have some poison for my sword on hand. I know there are some bosses that are still too difficult for me to attack.”

Minisa immediately transferred two bottles of Dragon Fever, her favorite poison she told him before. “Thank you. I think I’ll wait until the next time we do a huge quest with our Alliance members. Smiling Knight is tough, but if we’re focused, we can get him without me using it,” Jon reassured her.

“I trust you,” Minisa replied.

Jon couldn’t help but feel pleased by the notion, which was strange. It’s just a game they were playing, but her trusting him felt wonderful. As they continued wandering the woods to hopefully run into the Smiling Knight he decided to go back to an earlier subject. “Do you live in the dorms? My friends and I got lucky and we’re living in some off campus housing.”

“You’re lucky. I’m still in the dorms, but I don’t mind too much. My roommates are fun to be with.  I’m pretty sure my brother has a crush on my RA and well she never fails to flirt with him shamelessly. I don’t know why they don’t just go out on a date and put me out of my misery,” Minisa grumbled.

Jon smirked at that. “Well perhaps you can try arranging things? Sometimes it’s hard for people to see what’s right in front of them.”

“I’d rather not get involved with my brother and his romances. He falls in and out of love a lot. He’ll date girls and wind up breaking up with them. Our mother despairs a bit of what he’ll be doing down the road since he hasn’t been dating anyone longer than six months it seems,” Minisa replied. Her  avatar bent down to pick up some mushrooms they found underneath a large tree in the forest.

“Poor guy. My mother periodically asks me if I’m seeing anyone. I haven’t seen anyone in a long time. My last serious girlfriend broke things off with me in the worst way. But I won’t get into that,” Jon said. “Anyways, at least your parents aren’t pressuring you right?”

“Oh no, they certainly don’t. They feel that all their children, even Torrhen should decide for ourselves what we want to do. Anyways, they want me to be happy so there’s no pressure about getting a boyfriend or anything. Though I would like one someday,” Minisa said.

Jon was about to continue this conversation when he heard a rustle and turned to see bandits rushing out from behind some bushes. Then a large figure approached with sword drawn. It was the Smiling Knight. “He’s here! Get ready to attack!”

Minisa quickly stood next to him and faced the bandits. She promptly began strumming her harp and immediately Jon noticed the screen looked different. As the bandits approached them, large stones started hitting them from the sky. She was trying her new hail storm spell on them. It quickly knocked down a few of the bandits, but there were still some coming towards them. He could see that the Smiling Knight got hit a by a couple of the hail stones, but they only did relatively minor damage.

Jon drew his sword and immediately activated a minor spell that allowed him to increase his agility for the next ten minutes of battle. He quickly began stabbing and slashing the bandits while Minisa summoned another hailstorm to hit a few more bandits and some more damage on Smiling Knight. It took another round of hailstorm and a few quick slashes when all the bandits were dead except for the Smiling Knight.

He was a large brute and stared at them from behind his enclosed helm. “Your last chance to flee or death!”

“Ready?” Jon wrote to Minisa.

“Ready!” she replied.

Jon immediately ran towards the Smiling Knight and quickly activating Lightning Blade Strike. His sword sparked a bit with lightning as he soon slashed at the Smiling Knight causing the man to grunt in pain. Jon attacked with Lightning Blade Strike again before pulling back slightly to dodge the Knight’s answering slash.

The graphics on the Knight changed slightly as Minisa used her magic flute to summon icicles that stabbed into the Knight. They were making some additional damage, but Jon suspected the Knight still had a few thousand more HP to go. The Knight’s attention turned towards Minisa and started to walk towards her.

Jon activated Fire Swipe as his sword glowed orange to signify a fire type attack. He thrust his sword into the Knight, who promptly screamed in pain. The Knight was bleeding from the wounds Jon and Minisa inflicted on him as he turned to face Jon again.

“I think we’re winning! We’re almost there!” She quickly wrote before using her flute to attack the Smiling Knight with a blast of wind that knocked him down.

“Right!” Jon triggered Lightning Blade Strike again and did a flying jump to stab the Knight again.

The Knight shouted in pain and stopped moving. The Knight and bandits vanished from the forest and a pop-up window appeared.

_Congrats! You have defeated the dreaded Smiling Knight and the Kingswood Brotherhood. Hurry to King’s Landing and claim your reward! Bring the Knight’s helmet as proof to the Lord Commander of the City Watch!_

The message box disappeared and where the Smiling Knight once laid, his lone helmet was on the ground. Minisa quickly went over to pick it up and showed it to Jon. “Wow! We did it! This is amazing! I don’t think I’ve ever won a quest like this with just one partner before,” she said.

“I’m happy to do this with you. This is the first time we’ve done a quest just the two of us. It was a lot of fun,” Jon wrote back.

* * *

 “I’m glad you liked doing a quest with me. I was worried you’d get bored,” Sansa replied.

“I wouldn’t mind doing a quest like this with just you. Er… I mean…”

“I know what you mean,” Sansa replied back with a giggle. He really was sweet her White Wolf. “I guess we go to King’s Landing and claim the reward?”

“Let’s go do that,” WhiteWolf69 replied.

They activated the teleport button and arrived at the gates of King’s Landing where they joined the lines of people entering the city. It took a couple minutes of wandering through the crowded streets, but they arrived at the City Watch headquarters.

“What’s your business here?” one of the Goldcloaks asked gruffly.

Sansa showed off the Smiling Knight’s helmet. “We’ve slain the Knight and his Brotherhood.”

“Excellent great warriors! You can go up the stairs to the Lord Commander’s office,” the guard replied and allowed them to enter further into the castle.

“It’s a fun quest, but not the most difficult if you know the best strategies to complete it,” WhiteWolf69 explained. “The prize isn’t as special as the ones you get from those huge events, but still worth getting your hands on if you can.”

Sansa and WhiteWolf69 walked to the Lord Commander’s office. They see a stern man sitting in a chair behind a large desk with scrolls and quills all about him. They stood in front of the man.

“I have heard you brought me something important?” he asked.

Sansa presented the helmet to him, which he immediately took. “We have slain The Smiling Knight and his Brotherhood.”

“Impressive and good news for all of the Crownlands! The king shall be informed immediately! You and your companion shall receive your due reward for service to crown and kingdom!”

A pop-up window appeared on the screen.

_For killing the Smiling Knight and ending the threat of the Kingswood Brotherhood, you have received 5,000 gold dragons and a royal grant allowing you an upgrade to any armor or weapon of your choice!_

Sansa and her friend quickly left and found themselves wandering through different areas of King’s Landing. “I’m glad I was able to do this with you. I don’t often play with other people than my siblings and offline friends in the Clan. It’s great knowing there are other players that I could work well with.”

“It was good battling with you. I hope we can do this more often.”

“Do you want to hang out longer?” Sansa couldn’t help staring at the screen almost willing him to agree to continue playing a bit longer with her.

“Sure, Minisa. It’s a nice evening and I heard there’s a decent tavern with live music.”

“How romantic,” she replied. If it weren’t for the fact that she was looking at an avatar, she’d swear her friend was blushing.


	5. An Unexpected Proposal - Part 1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jon has something major to think about regarding his interactions with "Minisa Redwolf."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Let me start off by apologizing to any and all readers and followers of this story. I know it's been almost 3 weeks since I last updated this story. This is my modest attempt to make up for it. While I did warn everyone that I won't be following a particular posting schedule, I was kind of disappointed with myself about not getting this out sooner. I won't turn this into a blog entry (I sort of explained what's going on via my Tumblr). Basically it's a combination of dealing with some annoying, but much needed offline business and frankly youtube. Youtube is an endless source of distractions and I've been watching a lot of K-pop videos. I was already watching some, but it got worse once KCON NY happened a couple weeks ago. I'm currently working on the next chapter and I'm hoping that I won't wait until almost another three weeks to post it! I'm not 100% satisfied with this chapter, but hopefully you guys like it!

“So are you going to do it?” Pyp asked Jon eagerly.

“Do what?” Sam asked as he carefully transferred the chicken and vegetable stir fry from the frying pan into the serving bowl on the counter.

“You know Jonny boy over here asking that Minisa chick to marry him,” Pyp replied with a smirk. He casually leaned against a nearby wall while crossing his arms.

Sam almost dropped the frying pan in shock. “What?”

Jon rolled his eyes. “You know how in the game your character can be married to another character? That’s what he’s talking about and no I haven’t thought about asking her to marry me. In the game that is.”

“Come on man! You and that Minisa chick play together a lot when you’re not playing with us or her clan mates. It only makes sense you take it to the next level with her,” Pyp said with a grin.

Jon ignored his roommate as he went to the utensils drawer and pulled out a couple serving spoons. They were eating white rice, chicken and vegetable stir fry, and fish sticks they had popped into the oven to defrost. “Did you get the fish sticks out of the oven yet?”

“Not yet. Can you get them?” Sam asked as he took the serving spoons from Jon.

Jon promptly grabbed the oven mitts and quickly took the tray out and placed on top of the stove burners that were now off. He promptly transferred the fish sticks onto a serving dish and brought them to the small table they had in the dining room. There were four place settings where Sam and Pyp were already seated. Soon they heard the soft thumps on the stairs and Grenn appeared in the dining room.

“Thanks for the food!” Grenn said as he took his seat and opened up a can of beer that was at his place setting.

“Grenn, you gotta help me here! Jon won’t ask her to marry him,” Pyp grumbled as he started spooning some rice onto his plate.

“Seriously dude? Why don’t you just ask her? You and her make a good couple in the game,” Grenn said to Jon before taking a gulp of his beer.

Jon glared at Grenn before scooping up rice and accepting some fish sticks that Sam offered him. “Why are you two bugging me about this? It’s just a game!”

Sam cleared his throat. “Look… I don’t want to get into your own private business, Jon. I can’t help but agree with Pyp now that I think about it a bit more. I mean you get along with this Minisa player. It might do you some good to marry her in the game. They post a lot of events and challenges for married characters to participate in. In fact they just announced a new couples challenge this morning.”

“Really? What is it?” Pyp asked curiously before spearing a fish stick with his fork.

Sam gulped some of his beer before continuing. “Funny enough it’s actually a special quest for married couples to participate in. It’s called the Lost Treasure of Jonquil and Florian.”

Grenn smirked at Jon. “Jonquil and Florian, eh? Didn’t Minisa say that’s one of her favorite stories?”

Jon couldn’t lie and say it wasn’t when he knew for a fact it was. It was one of the many little details “Minisa” revealed about herself. There wasn’t a set rule, but they didn’t reveal their identities or too many details other than minor things. He didn’t know her other than as “Minisa.” She gradually got used to calling him as “Wolf,” though he still wished she could call him Jon.

“This is just ridiculous. You want me to marry her in this game? For a quest?” Jon scoffed before furiously chewing on some stir fry and rice.

“You’d hardly be the first player to do that. I would be shocked if at least half if not two thirds of the couples in the game didn’t get together just to do those couples quests or challenges,” Grenn said before grabbing some fish sticks.

“I’m not going to ask a girl to marry me because of a stupid game and that’s final!” Jon replied angrily before continuing to eat his meal.

* * *

 

Jon logged into the game along with Sam, Pyp, and Grenn. Edd was attending a research trip in Essos so he wouldn’t be logging into the game for at least another couple weeks. They all headed off to Wintertown Market Square to see if The Pack of Winterfell members were there today. Usually  at least one of them was in the game every day. They all met each of the Winterfell members at least a couple times by this point, but the ones they played with most were Minisa, Torrhen Greywolf, Arry Underfoot, Gendry Hammerhand, and Theon Hawkeye.

Torrhen and Arry were Minisa’s actual brother and sister. The Pack of Winterfell members got along with everyone in their group, particularly Jon, not long after Minisa first introduced him to them. The two clans liked to team up and do some quests together. The variety of players and skill levels often made a difference. They had yet to participate in an Alliance challenge, which only happened twice a year. Their clan wasn’t part of an alliance until meeting Minisa, so they missed out on the previous event in April. However it was likely they’d join in the big event happening later in the year.

As it turned out Arry was already there practicing her fencing moves. She liked practicing even when they were in towns to hone her maneuvering skills. Unlike Minisa and Torrhen, they knew Arry and Bran Raveneyes, another one of Minisa’s siblings, were both high school students which explained why they only played on Friday nights and the weekends during the school year.

“Hey Arry, been here long?” Jon typed.

Arry stopped to look at Jon. “Just five minutes ago. I was hoping someone else would show up. S… I mean my sister said she’d be coming home soon. She and our brother went to lunch with our parents. Some boring lunch meeting with some friends of our parents or whatever.”

Jon couldn’t help but grin at the girl’s dismissive attitude. From what he could gleam from past conversations, Minisa’s family must have been upper middle class if not wealthy. They didn’t act snobby or flashy in the game, but there were mentions of “boring tea parties” and “some snobby dinner with not enough food to eat” Arry would complain about.

“Lunch meeting?” Sam asked politely.

Arry hopped onto the ledge of the water fountain and got comfortable. “Yeah it’s this man who is one of the directors at the company my dad runs. Anyways he’s probably trying to get my brother to date one of his granddaughters or something. I mean who does that these days? I didn’t think dating someone for a business deal was still a thing, but that’s not my problem. I’d say hell no to that in an instant.”

Jon and the others tamped down their urges to ask Arry exactly what company their dad ran, but that would violate the unspoken rule between the players. “You mean your brother doesn’t already have a girlfriend? I mean that would solve his problem,” Sam replied.

“Hah! Well there’s this girl that he’s kind of into at school. She’s the same year as him and actually she’s my sister’s RA too. He’s flirted with her a bit or at least that’s what my sister said. Unfortunately those two idiots haven’t actually done anything past flirting so I got no idea what is happening there,” Arry finished her little commentary about her siblings. Jon was aware of this as Minisa had complained to him about the same thing weeks ago.

“Any idea if anyone else is going to come online? That way we can decide what to do next,” Sam suggested.

“Other than my brother and sister? I dunno for sure. That stupid Bull and Theon might pop in later, but who really knows. They didn’t tell me. But I do hope you guys might be able to help me with something and you CAN’T tell my sister!”

“What sort of help?” Pyp typed.

“Okay so when I logged in I was checking out the bulletin board and I noticed the relationships section had some announcement that I hope my sister doesn’t see. It’s about that asshat Harry the Falcon Douche,” Arry wrote.

The four roommates glanced at each other over their laptop monitors before turning back to their respective screens. Minisa briefly mentioned it, but on the rare occasions she wasn’t playing with them, her siblings explained that she had been briefly married to a player for a couple months and then was unceremoniously dumped. He paid her 20,000 gold and asked her for a game divorce. It was clear that their game marriage was a pragmatic one, but apparently Minisa was a little hurt that her game partner ditched her out of nowhere. From the little bit they knew of her, she didn’t like to cause a fuss and agreed to the divorce.

“Let me guess, he found some other chick to marry?” Grenn wrote.

“Ugh… yeah it’s some chick named Myranda De Vine. She’s not a particularly strong player. I mean she’s only level 9, an archer, and her PVP ranking is pretty low too. Just about anyone in our clan could take her on alone and kick her ass,” Arry replied.

“Whoa… I looked up Myranda. She won the female player photo beauty contest. She got the most votes a few months ago when they did the poll,” Pyp wrote.

“He really is a douche. I wouldn’t be surprised if that’s why he dumped my sister. Let me guess Myranda has big boobs or something? Anyways I’m hoping you guys can help me prevent my sister from finding out about the announcement. More importantly the wedding is happening this afternoon,” Arry wrote. “We all told my sister she should submit her picture to the contest, but she didn’t want to. She thought it was stupid having an online beauty contest where people are judging her. I have to admit she has a point, but still. My sister is more beautiful than that Myranda.”

Jon couldn’t help but be intrigued by Arry’s statement. He wouldn’t deny being curious about what the real Minisa looked like, but then again he didn’t show her what he looked like either. Of course he did model his character as closely to true appearance. He had black, curly hair though he kept it much shorter than the man-bun look he used for his avatar. If the girl who played as Minisa really modeled the character after her real appearance, then she was a beautiful redhead with blue eyes. Jon tried not to think about how attractive he found that if only to avoid disappointment when they eventually meet offline.

“So does that mean your sister is a ginger?” Pyp unknowingly asked the question Jon had been wondering for some time now.

“Well I have to admit most of us designed our characters to look more like what we actually look like in real life. My older brother was annoyed his hair isn’t quite red enough and looks too brown in the game. His hair is darker than my sister, but they both take after our mom’s side of the family. My younger brothers also look more like Mom’s side of the family. I’m the only one that looks more like our dad. Anyway so you think you guys can help me? I mean I don’t want S…  my sister getting hurt and everything because of that wedding announcement,” Arry wrote.

“We’ll try, but you know she’ll find out eventually. Though are you sure she’s really that upset? I mean she never acted like she cared,” Pyp wrote.

“That’s just my sister for you. You can’t be sure what she’s feeling. Sometimes she really doesn’t care and sometimes she’s just waiting to get into her bedroom and cry her eyes out while watching some Jane Austen thing… for the fiftieth time,” Arry said.

Jon frowned reading that. Minisa can’t really be that upset about this guy could she? It didn’t quite fit with the bit of her personality he saw when they interacted with each other. No matter what she deserved to be treated better. He was about to type a response when another player appeared next to him.

“Hi everyone. Sorry we’re late!” Minisa typed. Her brother Torrhen was next to her.

“Gods that was a long lunch. Mr. M was practically throwing Wyn at me!” Torrhen griped. “She’s on the dean’s list every semester just like you. Too bad you didn’t come to White Harbor Uni, but your school is excellent, lad!”

“Wyn is a pretty girl. You could take her on one date. She looked like she was interested,” Minisa replied.

“You’re just saying that because he doesn’t have any grandsons to throw at you and both his sons are married and too old for you. Though Mr. K was eyeing you at the last company barbecue. He’s got at least three sons only a bit older than me. I swear Eddy kept asking me if you were seeing anyone,” Torrhen wrote.

“Wish it was that easy finding a girlfriend. I’ve gotten no luck,” Pyp replied.

“Oh by the way guys, you’ll never guess what message was waiting for me on my inbox here in the game,” Minisa wrote. Jon could practically hear her snort as she continued typing. “Myranda sent me a message inviting me to her and Harry’s wedding today.”

“Oh… so you knew?” Sam asked.

“Well someone from Harry’s clan wrote me last week saying that he and Myranda were getting married. They figured I might want a head’s up so I wouldn’t be too shocked by the announcement. I really don’t care. He was just my game husband and we did a few quests that required a couple to participate. I mean if he hadn’t asked for the divorce, I would have asked for one eventually.”

“Wait really? So you weren’t angry?” Arry wrote. “I thought that was just you being strong around the house in front of me and R… I mean Torrhen and Bran. Gods know Mom and Dad wouldn’t get the idea of any of us being married in a game of all things.”

“I seriously didn’t care. I mean Harry is actually a decent player, but Gods he wouldn’t shut up for more than two minutes! Most of the time when we’re not attacking a monster or finishing a quest, conversations with him was mostly about how much money he has, how connected he is, and why are his professors so difficult when he has to stay on the football team since he’s the team captain, etc. I bet you the only reason why he knows I’m a red head is the fact my avatar is a red head. I know more about his class schedule this past semester than he probably knows about what I like to eat!”

Jon glared at the screen. He glanced up and saw his roommates has similar reactions. Sam frowned and shook his head in disbelief. Grenn’s eyes were narrowed.

Pyp rolled his eyes and met Jon’s look before furiously typing a response. “Seriously? What a douche. Not even asking one question about you? I mean you might be married in a game, but he didn’t even try to be your friend and ask stuff about you?”

“He only asked me questions the first couple days of our ‘marriage’ and that was about it. Not to mention he kind of asked me to marry him out of the blue too! We’d only chatted with each other in the game like twice when he proposed on our third meeting.”

“Ugh… I seriously asked her if she had gone insane when she told me she said yes,” Torrhen added. “The only reason why they were even talking in the first place was because of that ‘Random Clan-dom’ event last year,” Torrhen explained.

Jon sighed. He remembered that event. Jon and everyone else in Wandering Crows were still members of Castle Black. Unlike most of the other Clans and Alliances, The Night’s Watch Alliance was the only Alliance specifically created by the creators of Legends of Westeros. All the Clans that were part of the Night’s Watch Alliance were named after the actual castles built along the actual Wall making it the only Alliance that had 19 Clans in it. All other Alliances were limited to just 10 Clans. Also unlike other Alliances none of the Clans in it could choose to leave or be expelled. Members of the individual Clans were allowed to leave if they chose to unlike the real original Night’s Watch.

The “Random Clan-dom” event was literally a worldwide event in the game where every Clan was randomly assigned a partner Clan to do the event with. It was designed to be a bit of a “get to know you” sort of event where Clans that had never worked together before could meet players that they’d probably never encounter otherwise. It was unfortunate that Clan Castle Black was partnered with Mance’s Raiders because in an awkward twist of fate, Jon’s ex Ygritte was a member.

“Random Clan-dom” was a game wide scavenger hunt where the partner Clans had to solve puzzles and occasionally defeat other partner Clans in battles. Losing the battles would result in those Clans being eliminated from the event. It was beyond awkward once Ygritte realized Jon was WhiteWolf69 and mercilessly teased Jon about it until Grenn came to his defense about how Ygritte was never good at giving and always receiving before she finally stopped. Normally Jon and his friends were competitive guys, but they were all glad for his sake that Castle Black and Mance’s Raiders got eliminated on the second day of the weeklong event. Ygritte never attempted to speak to Jon or any of his friends again afterwards, which was just as well.

“You know… I’m actually thinking about going to that wedding,” Minisa wrote in the group chat window.

“Wait.. you serious?” Grenn typed.

“Why not? I frankly don’t care if he gets married. Besides, it’s kind of funny if I showed up and people that knew about him and me start wondering if I’m going to cause drama,” Minisa explained.

“While that’s mildly amusing, I don’t know why you’re bothering. I mean who cares what some other players may think?” Arry wrote back.

“Well if I actually showed up and didn’t cause any trouble it’ll make it clear I really don’t care he’s getting married and I’m the ‘scorned woman.’ It’s annoying running into other players from Eyrie’s Falcons asking me if I’m okay after Harry asked for the divorce. I mean there’s only so much of it I could take for weeks afterwards!” Minisa answered.

“You’re not seriously going to go to the whole wedding will you? I mean the two of them are listed as Faith of the Seven, so you know their wedding is a long ceremony with all the oils and whatever,” Arry grumbled.

“Nah, I’ll just watch the wedding parade after the ceremony is over. The ceremony in the game lasts like 15 minutes and the invitation said its scheduled to begin about ten minutes ago. So I figure I can kill time and just head over there to watch a bit and leave,” Minisa said.

“Do you want any of us to go with you?” Jon wrote.

Minisa turned to look at Jon’s avatar. “You guys don’t have to unless you want to. It’s undoubtedly boring for the rest of you especially since you Crows don’t know Harry.”

“Nah, we can come along. It’s to support you. And show that you’ve got friends that’ll watch your back. Besides the parade doesn’t take all that long so no big deal. Where’s this wedding at anyway?” Jon asked.

“Oh well it’s at Gulltown appropriately enough,” Minisa answered.

“Oh! I heard there’s a couple interesting quests and even some monsters on the road to the Eyrie. None of us in Wandering Crows ever tried them. What about you guys?” Sam typed.

“We haven’t played anything over there in a couple months. Not a bad plan really. I don’t have any other ideas for what to do together,” Torrhen said.

“Well let’s go wait for the parade,” Minisa said. Soon they all clicked onto the world map and teleported to Gulltown.

* * *

 

It didn’t take long after they arrived that other players hanging around for the parade started chatting about Minisa.

“Whoa she actually showed up!”

“What does she think she’s doing? She’s got a lot of nerve showing her face around here. She’ll ruin Myranda’s day!”

“Hey who’s that guy next to her?”

It was then that Jon noticed he was standing right next to Minisa. He immediately reached for her hand to hold in his. Minisa immediately turned to look at him before smiling and linking her fingers to his. She shifted slightly to lean a bit against him.

“She’s not married, but I wonder if that guy will marry her soon.”

Jon was uncomfortably reminded of that conversation the other night with the other guys. He glanced at Minisa, who was placidly watching the crowd and waiting for the wedding procession from the Sept of Gulltown to begin. While he didn’t know if Minisa was really as beautiful as her avatar depicted, he sensed her generosity and kindness. She offered each of the guys a gift of game food once they became members of the Winter-Rose Alliance. When they fought as a group, she’d always make sure her Harmonious Shield was holding up when they got bombarded by magic attacks. She was almost as good at solving puzzles as Sam. As much as Jon wanted to deny it, he really was falling for Minisa. Still he didn’t want to marry in the game. It didn’t feel like the right decision. At least it didn’t until now.

Soon people started cheering and the music in the game changed. The soon saw banners flying and an elaborate open carriage appearing down the street coming closer towards them. Jon wasn’t terribly impressed with the extravagance, but his opinion didn’t matter. He carefully glanced at Minisa. She watched calmly with little change in her expression. The cheering grew louder as the carriage got closer to them. Jon saw why as the glint of gold flashed above them. People started catching gold coins. Everyone around them except him and Minisa scrambled for the coins.

“What a predictable show off,” Minisa replied. “Harry always did like to flash gold around like he’s a Lannister.”

Jon smirked before typing. “Did he do that when you married him?”

“I didn’t want a wedding this flashy. We had a quiet ceremony at the Sept of Riverrun. He did arrange for a really fancy wedding reception in the game though. It was mostly to flash his money off to his Clan. Everyone else in my Clan at the time thought it was ridiculous, but I wasn’t paying for it so I didn’t make a big deal out of the expense. I wouldn’t be surprised if this was as much Myranda’s idea as it is his,” Minisa explained.

It didn’t appear the bride or groom noticed Minisa’s presence, but was just as well. Soon the crowd dispersed as the carriage disappeared down the road. Soon the group gathered together and teleported to the Vale of Arryn. It was a challenge trying to get to the Eyrie. Along the way they’d have to fight various monsters that lie in wait for unwary travelers. Historically the “Hill Tribes of the Vale” waylaid and robbed people, but it went against the way this game was structured for human characters to kill and attack NPC’s that were other humans. So they’d have to fight trolls, random fantastical animals and pass the great riddle of the Griffon, who was the guardian of the Eyrie.

Sam and MInisa were the only magic users in their group, so their jobs was mostly going to be providing defense and healing. Only when they threatened to be overwhelmed by packs of trolls or other such animals would be when one or even both of them would join the offense. There was supposed to be a great prize, but it was a mystery to the group what that prize would be given they hadn’t done this quest before. Hopefully it was worth the effort they were about to endure.


	6. An Unexpected Proposal - Part 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Plans being made here!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So here's another chapter. I'm working on another chapter as well, but I might not be able to post it as soon as I would hope. We'll see how things turn out the next couple weeks. I might go back to the chapters I have so far and do some additional edits. Feel free to re-read this story and see if you notice the little changers!

Sansa was sitting by the water fountain in Wintertown this evening. Robb and Theon were out drinking with some other people tonight instead of playing LoW tonight. Arya was still at the movies with her friends and wouldn’t be back for at least another half hour. Sansa didn’t mind most of the time, but she would be lying if she didn’t feel a little jealous that her siblings were having fun this summer while she was at home on a Friday night. It surprised Sansa that her old friend Jeyne Poole was currently dating Theon and she was also at the pub with Theon and Robb tonight. She hoped WhiteWolf69 was going to show up like he promised. He had sent her a message the other night confirming he’d be available to meet her in the game on Friday night.

Sansa didn’t know why she was feeling so anxious. She had been feeling this way since Harry’s wedding almost two weeks ago. Maybe she was also anxious for the new school semester to start. Normally she’d be savoring summer vacation as much as she can. She worked on some short stories and had notes down for a possible novel! Also she was still working on her costume. That was her third hobby other than writing and playing Legends of Westeros. She loved making clothes, but she’s been planning something huge.

She and the clan were going to cosplay at Gamepalooza XVI in April. It took some negotiating and some coaxing, but everyone agreed to the idea. Sansa’s parents agreed to allow Bran and Arya to attend the convention since it was happening during Spring Break.

“Really? Oh my gods! Yeah!!!” Arya whooped and jumped up and down in the living room at the news.

“So many people in class will be jealous!” Bran smirked a bit. There was a twinkle in his eye as he was probably imagining what his costume should look like.

“Where exactly is this convention happening, dear?” their mother asked turning to Robb.

“They usually alternate between King’s Landing Convention Center and Harrenhal. It’s Harrenhal this time around,” Robb explained.

“Well if you would like, I could call your grandfather and see if you could stay at Riverrun instead of spending money on a hotel room. If the traffic isn’t too bad you could just drive back and forth. It’s only 45 minutes away,” their mother said.

“That would help things along, but where would we get the car other than renting it?” Sansa pointed out.

“Well I suppose if I asked you could borrow a car from your grandfather or even one of your uncles. You know how much your uncle Edmure spends too much time collecting cars,” their mother sighed.

The conversation was productive and they made some plans on how to travel to Riverrun and their mother agreed to ask their grandfather if they could stay with him for the convention weekend. Though there was little doubt that their grandfather would agree. He was always happy to get visits from his grandchildren as they generally only visited once a year though he and Uncle Edmure would travel up to Winterfell for visits as well.

A couple phone calls later, they had free accommodation for the convention and a four door sedan they could borrow to drive back and forth between Riverrun and Harrenhal. The four Stark siblings were each traveling by regional plane from Winterfell and Oldtown respectively. They’d wait for each other at the airport and one of the uncles would pick them up. Bran and Arya swore up and down they’d keep their grades up so their parents would pay for their con and plane tickets. Sansa and Robb agreed to pay for their own tickets since they were both had part-time jobs in Oldtown.

Some of the others were planning to attend after various agreements and arrangements were made with their parents to some extent. It quickly turned into a giant group travel plan. Theon was going to rent a car and agreed to help drive people along with Asha, Meera and Gendry, who were the only non-Starks that had a driver’s license. Also unlike the Starks, everyone else in their Clan had to book hotel rooms, but fortunately everyone agreed to be roommates as needed so they only needed to book four rooms. Shireen was surprisingly allowed to attend despite her strict parents. It was mainly because they were assured her cousin Gendry was going as well, so they trusted him to be responsible and look after her. After sorting out the travel, hotel arrangements, and how everyone would be paying for their share of the costs, the last thing they had to figure out was the group cosplay. The obvious decision was everyone should dress up as their avatars, but the issue was organizing that.

Sansa was responsible for tailoring and making the costumes for anyone who couldn’t figure out how to make their own costumes. They had to agree to pay her back the money that she spent on material as she was happy to do the labor for free. The other surprising thing was that a couple of Sansa’s old friends, Jeyne Poole and Beth Cassel offered to help Sansa.

“Sansa, we might not be into gaming, but you know we both enjoy cosplay. This sounds like a lot of fun too,” Jeyne said to her. She smirked. “It’s also an excuse for me to spend more time with Theon while I measure him…” Sansa didn’t want to know any further than that. So the two of them offered the same deal to the Clan members that were in the North, particularly Theon, Asha, and Bran’s and Arya’s friends. Shireen assured everyone that she would manage her own costume as long as Gendry would help craft a mage’s staff for her.

Gendry was surprisingly good at making fake weapons. He was in charge of doing the weapons, but Sansa’s siblings were also interested in chipping in. Theon was providing his own since he was an amateur competitive archer and actually won a few competitions in the past. Though of course he couldn’t bring real arrows that he’d use in competition since that would be too dangerous. However he could bring the special plastic ones to pose in the cosplay shots.

While Sansa was waiting for WhiteWolf69 to finally appear, she was sewing Arya’s assassin costume. She opted to work on Bran’s and Arya’s costumes first since it was still summer break and she was at home. Once fall semester started, she’d shift over to hers and Robb’s costumes along with Gendry’s since he was also attending school at Oldtown. Jeyne promised to work on costumes for Asha, Theon, and the Reed siblings. Jeyne and Meera Reed were currently classmates at White Harbor University and regularly saw one another. Beth Cassel is still in high school with Arya, so she agreed to make costumes for Lommy and Hot Pie. She also promised to help out with any other costumes if Jeyne or Sansa got backlogged, which both girls appreciated.

Sansa, Jeyne, and Beth had made a couple trips to the fabric store in Wintertown purchasing various items that they knew would be needed for most of the costumes they were helping to make. Sansa had shown the other girls pictures of what everyone’s avatars looked like and they had to plan out what would be needed to produce the best looking costumes. Jeyne was currently studying in the fashion department and hoped working on the cosplay would be useful for her portfolio. Beth planned on majoring in fashion as well and planned on using the cosplay in her own portfolio as well.

Sansa heard a ping sound from the chat window and looked up after finishing another stitch. A smile grew as she saw it was her dear Wolf.

“Sorry I’m late! My dog was being a bit difficult tonight,” he wrote.

Sansa carefully put Arya’s costume down and quickly typed back. “Is he alright?”

“I had to stay at work late because of a project I’ve been dealing with the past couple of weeks. He was annoyed at me for being home later than I would normally be. Anyway, I hope you weren’t waiting too long,” he replied.

“Actually I kept myself occupied checking on the potions I’m brewing and doing some sewing.”

“You sew?”

“Oh I forgot! We actually planned this just a few weeks ago. The Pack of Winterfell are going to Gamepalooza! We’re doing a giant group cosplay as our avatars!” she typed excitedly. “I was actually working on Arry’s costume while I was waiting for you. I think I’ll finish hers and Bran’s costumes before I have to head back to campus.”

“Wow! That’s amazing. The guys and I were thinking of going too, but we’re not much for cosplaying.”

“Are you seriously going? Because if you are, then maybe you could travel with my brother, Gendry, and Storm Doe. My siblings and I have family in the Riverlands so we’re going to be staying at their place and borrowing a car back and forth. Everyone else in the group are getting hotel rooms and bunking together as needed.”

“I’ll have to talk to the guys later. Um… Minisa?”

“Yeah, Wolf?”

“Um… I do have something important to ask you. We’ve been playing together for a couple months now. And we’ve worked well together, don’t you think?”

Sansa couldn’t help being confused and slightly worried about what was going on. “Sure we do. We’ve done a couple quests with just us. We’ve hung out a bit alone. We even work well with our clans too. Is something wrong, Wolf?”

Whitewolf69 stepped closer to her and soon kneeled on one knee holding her hand. “MInisa Redwolf, will you marry me?”

Sansa gasped as she stared at the words in the chat box. She couldn’t deny she considered this player a good partner in the game when they worked together. She was growing excited with each meeting at not only playing with him but the prospect of meeting up with him and his friends once she returned to campus. She took a deep breath and promptly responded.

“Yes.”

* * *

 

Jon couldn’t help but grin at her response. If she was standing right in front of him in real life, he’d probably give into the urge to spin her around in his arms. But fortunately not because he’d only embarrass himself. He quickly clicked his mouse and transferred an item out of his inventory to her.

“Oh! What’s this?” she typed again.

“It’s actually something I was planning on giving you if you said yes. It’s I guess an engagement present you could call it.”

Jon couldn’t help but be proud of himself. It took ages to save up all the raw materials, but he was pleased to find out he had enough material to give a blacksmith in King’s Landing to create an excellent item appropriate for a very feminine player like Minisa. He could tell that Minisa had quickly put on the gift as a necklace appeared on her character.

“This is really pretty! Thank you!” Minisa wrote.

“Did you notice your stats after putting it on?” Jon was particularly pleased with not only how good the necklace turned out to be, but the bonus stats that would be imbued on whoever wore it.

“WOW!!!!” Minisa quickly typed. “Your gift boosted my stats by 10 points on my attack, defense, agility and strength! I can’t believe it!!!”

“Even if I’m not playing the game with you, I’m hoping you’ll be protected with the extra boosts in your stats,” Jon replied.

“You’re sweet. Thank you,” Minisa typed again before making her character twirl around in glee.

Jon couldn’t help thinking she was cute. It was one of the things he liked about her. She always had room to be happy go lucky and adorable. “I know we’ve never really talked about this before… but I kind of feel like now that we’re progressing to marriage in this game… I want to tell you my name.”

“You’re right. It’s very strange not knowing your real name and for you not to know mine. Then again I never really told Harry my name considering he didn’t seem to care anyway.”

Jon glared at his laptop at the reminder of her selfish “ex-husband.” He shook his head and took another gulp of his Umberland ale before responding. “I do care because you are you and should be recognized for being the wonderful woman I’ve known for a couple months now.”

“I can’t believe you would say that. That’s the most wonderful thing anyone has said to me in months.”

Jon couldn’t help but smile at that. “Hello, my name is Jon Snow.” He made his avatar bow to her.

She was silent before she made her character curtsey. “Hello Jon. My name is Sansa Stark.”

Jon couldn’t help staring hard at the screen. Sansa… Stark? Things were getting strange as he now realized the young woman he was developing feelings for was practically the princess of the North.

“So then, that means Torrhen is Robb Stark?”

“Yes! You’re very good at guessing,” Sansa replied. Yes it was good to think of her by her real name and not just “Minisa” anymore.

* * *

 

Sansa couldn’t help but giggle in delight as she finally knew “Wolf’s” real name. Yes, it would be nice to start thinking and calling him Jon instead. It was a real name for a real man. She wondered if she could do a search for him in the student directory or maybe on social media. It might make her sound like a stalker, but she didn’t care. He had been gradually fascinating her much to Arya’s amusement, but she couldn’t help it. Wolf or rather Jon was knightly as she used to fantasize about as a kid.

“So are we still on? About you know… meeting in person before school starts? Robb and I will be there a week before classes start. I’m happy that this will be my last year living in the dorms. Robb is going to work on his masters right away after he graduates this year, so he’s getting an apartment. He said I could live with him if I wanted to,” Sansa said. She continued working on her sewing and managed to get another three stitches in the hood for Arya’s costume when she heard a ping signaling Jon wrote her something.

“Well the guys and I agreed we’re doing a small barbecue at our house. It’ll be you, Robb, and Gendry?”

“Yep we’re the only three at Oldtown. Everyone else is up in the North. Storm Doe is at a boarding school in King’s Landing, so she won’t come. Anyways, it’ll be good to finally meet in person. Are we just eating and hanging out or are we doing a LAN Party?” Sansa typed away. She went back to her sewing until she heard a ping from Jon.

“We don’t have to play unless you guys want to. Though you’d have to bring your own laptops,” Jon replied.

“I’ll ask Robb and Gendry if they want to do it. But do you have a good enough internet connection for all of us?” Sansa wrote again before finishing up the hood of Arya’s costume.

“Ours is okay, but we’d slow it down if seven or eight people were playing at once. We are just within acceptable speed when all four of us are online at the same time,” Jon replied.

“We could see about getting a hotspot. But that’ll have to depend on whether we’re going to play or not. Do you want to do anything tonight or are we just hanging out… because there is another we could talk instead of being in the game if that’s the case.”

“Well there’s a couple small quests we could do together. Some other people we know might log in later.”

“Okay. What quest do you want to try?”

“How about we try finding the Ghost of High Heart?”

“Okay. I always thought the story of Duncan and Jenny so sad and beautiful.” A couple clicks later they teleported to the mysterious High Heart.

**Author's Note:**

> There isn't really one solid running plotline in this story. Most of the chapters will be "episodes" in the lives of Sansa, her family, friends, and maybe some others. I don't have a particular "ending" planned out for the story. It's really kind of a loose collection of amusing things that happen to the characters both online and offline. If people want to throw out suggestions for possible incidents or game quests they think might want to read about, I'll keep an open mind and consider them. You will definitely get a mention if I use your suggestion!
> 
> I have also noted in the tags that this story is loosely inspired by this 2016 Chinese rom-com whose English title is Love 020. I'm watching it on US Netflix. It is also available on Viki.com. I highly recommend watching this series if you want an amusing story set in a university about college kids in love and meeting one another via MMORPG.
> 
> I'm gifting this story to two regular Jonsa readers / commenters. Your continued support to your fellow fans never ceases to amaze me and really encourage all of us who bother typing and sharing our works with you.


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